English language being my strongest subject in school, gave me stress. ME. Because this time, the board exams were a little too official.
I entered the examination centre with my head held high, only to find out that I was not allowed to carry my water bottle inside. And after looking at the hustle and bustle outside the centre, I now know what teachers mean when they say “is this a fish market?” Because yes, it was looking like one. And the customers were doing everything except bargaining. Like bringing everyone’s morale down by asking questions no one had heard of before and testing people’s knowledge as if the exam anxiety wasn’t enough.
And then, after getting seated in our respective classrooms, we had a total of forty five minutes to spare which we spent vaguely discussing our fear and the fact that something was instinctively suspicious about the interiors of the school. And shortly a while after, we had the answer booklet in our hands, in which we had to fill our details.
A bit later, I felt like I had asked too many questions, but what are the invigilators for, after all? It felt like every time someone would darken the wrong circle in the OMR sheet, an alarm would ring and two security guards would throw them out of the school and terminate their examination. The fear was real. I even started doubting my ability to read and write and checked the spelling of my name at least twice or thrice before proceeding.
The answer booklet had a seal which was to be broken before we could write in it. I was trying to be as calm and collected as possible throughout the examination. But I needed water, my mouth was dry as a desert specially after consuming ‘seven’ almonds in the morning, (for good memory). We don’t have the dahi or ‘Vijay Bhava› ritual in our family, but almonds are a nice alternative. And out of this desperate need to drink water, just when I was about to shout, ‘YOU GOTTA DO SOMETHING MAN’, an angel walked through the door with a tray full of glasses filled with cool and refreshing water. It was just perfect.
I wish I could thank her later on for quenching my thirst. The invigilator was looking at us like we were born to cheat, and everything and anything we do is some sort of an offence. I tried to build rapport with the invigilator but, wait, my mind reasoned, isn›t focussing on using the fanciest words in my English exam more important, as it’s the examiner I should be trying to impress? Anyway, I wound up my paper in time, luckily, and all in all, it was a movie-like experience.
The security was tight and some students› dream of executing something like ‹Ocean›s eight› was certainly shattered, as the packet in which the question paper came in had ‘CONFIDENTIAL’ written on the top, which was truly terrifying. To conclude, it was all super weird but we made peace with it because the paper was easy.
